TCPMP | OMG!!! Now FULL Video on our Treo

Update Nov 06 - The Core Pocket Media Player (TCPMP) has now been further upgraded in a full commercial version called CorePlayer and available for both PalmOS and Windows Mobile Treo Smartphones.

There's a new application that is sure to rock a boat or two in the Treo community and it is very good news indeed for all Treonauts who like me may have been waiting to take their video-on-the go experience to the next level...

I've just finished evaluating a new open source (completely free) media player called The Core Pocket Media Player (TCPMP) and I can tell you that although it hasn't even come out of alpha testing yet that this is one monster of a media player - particularly when it comes to video. It has been as close to 'video Nirvana' on my Treo 650 as I believe I'm likely to get.

TCPMP supports all the usual video formats such as .AVI (DIVX/XVID) and .MPG but additionally and uniquely also offers playback for .OGM (OGG media video) and .MKV (Matroska) - basically it can play any video file that you can see fit to throw at it. Moreover, it can also play music in various formats although the interface experience is a very basic one and at any rate you're unlikely to use it as your main or even secondary music player. The only thing currently lacking is AC3 audio support. The various existing supported codecs include:

Audio codecs:

Mpeg 1 LayerIII (mp3)

Ogg Vorbis

Musepack

Adpcm, uLaw

Video codec:

DivX

XviD

Mpeg4-SP (plus B-frame support)

Mpeg1

M-JPEG

However all of this is not by a wide margin the most important bit of news about TCPMP. The best part is that our days of having to re-encode each of our video files for playback on a 320x320 or other small handheld screen size are gone. That's right, you have to do exactly zero, nada, niente to playback any video currently on your hard drive and view it on your Treo. Just copy the file to your SD card and you can start watching it.

As I mentioned previously, TCPMP's interface is nothing particularly pretty to look at but to be honest with this video performance it could not have one at all and I wouldn't care less - just let me enjoy the fantastic playback. The main screen offers you the standard backward/play/forward buttons, a full screen button to access the audio, video and general preferences. Nothing more is needed.

I tested TCPMP with a couple of 700MB video files encoded at a high bitrate and 576x304 resolution and another at 624x336. Both large screenshots in this post are full size 320x320 ones of these clips on my Treo and as you'll be able to appreciate the quality is absolutely stunning.

I am ecstatic to report that I had absolutely no problem loading these files, watching them and fast forwarding through them in the highest quality that you can imagine on our small Treo screen with full lip sync and no video image stuttering whatsoever. If this is not a milestone in Treo video playback then I don't know what is.

I've spent the better part of my day demoing this to anyone within eyesight to make sure that I haven't been dreaming the whole thing up. I admit that I'm still a little overwhelmed. TCPMP is absolutely a_m_a_z_i_n_g and following my post yesterday I guess that now our Treo can also be considered among the best portable video players that money can buy.

Comments

The site seems to be down. Can anybody upload it some where and place a link to it?

Thanks,

Al

2

by Rich...! | Apr 16, 2005 4:07:46 AM

Oh hell yeah, you just made my day...!

3

by Tony Cooper | Apr 16, 2005 8:54:21 AM

Are you running the program from your 650 or from your SD card? I am running GoodLink for my corporate Exchange Server and it is a memory hog. I am running everything else from my 1GB (32X) SD card using PowerRun. If I can run it from the card, that would be sweet.

4

by Andrew | Apr 16, 2005 9:26:11 AM

Hi Tony,

Thanks for reminding me to check that... Glad to report that after moving TCPMP to my SD card with PowerRun the performance remains completely unchanged.

TCPMP only occupies 1MB of memory and because I use multiple 1GB SD card I prefer to keep the application on-board.

I can't wait for 2GB SD cards to become more widely available and even cheaper so that I can travel with 3 or 4 movies at a time.

Very cool indeed!

Cheers, A.

5

by James | Apr 16, 2005 2:43:42 PM

Here's the links that you people are looking for ok :) I have it and it works great EVEN in alpha!!!

Cheers Andrew!
I agree on the 2GB cards, though my USB adapter is very small and very inexpensive; I am still looking forward to the 2GB version that directly adapts to USB. Ultimate portability and flexibility.

11

by traut | Apr 17, 2005 11:29:57 PM

Will this work if I download to my mac? I apoligize if this seems ignorant on my part. Thanks.

12

by Andrew | Apr 18, 2005 7:08:07 AM

Traut,

Absolutely, TCPMP is an application running on your Treo not your computer.

Cheers, A.

13

by dafttreo | Apr 19, 2005 3:16:38 PM

Anyone know if this works on the 600?

14

by Andrew | Apr 19, 2005 3:22:23 PM

dafttreo,

I didn't test on a 600 but there's no reason that it wouldn't work - naturally the performance on the 650 will be better + the screen resolution will make for a completely different experience.

Cheers,

Andrew

15

by Jeff | Apr 19, 2005 8:29:35 PM

Sorry, I'm a novice . . . . what's the diff between the "acc" and "without acc" versions? Is that all I need to install? What about the huge file titled "betaplayer" -- what do I do with that?

16

by Top Billing | Apr 21, 2005 12:28:56 PM

What an excellent find!

One question -- I installed TCPMP and loaded a few video files. When I play them back, they all are very choppy and slow. Is this a memory issue or an encoding issue? Any ideas?

17

by Duncan | Apr 22, 2005 10:37:11 PM

Top Billing,
I had the same issues.... I finally re-encoded my test files down to a lower resolution (i.e. 320 x something) until it worked... & worked like a charm it did. VERY cool app!! Reality is encoding at a higher res. is a waste of space anyway so knock down the res and enjoy!

18

by tripham | Apr 25, 2005 9:24:18 PM

Hi all, thanks for the great info. I've only had the Treo 650 for 3 days but the first thing I wanted to do was to get it to play a dvd movie. TCPMP is awesome. However, I did a test and tried calling my Treo while the movie was playing and all I get is a busy signal. Is this correct? Can I set a preference so that the incoming calls interrupt the movie? thanks.

19

by Bill | Apr 26, 2005 6:29:12 PM

I have just installed the tcpmp on my T600, it rocks!

20

by Cory | Apr 27, 2005 11:47:06 AM

Sorry for such a basic question, but am new with my Treo. I put some mp3 files on my card, and now here is the simple question: how the heck can I delete them once they are on the card??

21

by Spanky | Apr 27, 2005 3:02:25 PM

I have downloaded the tcpmp and it will run any movie i throw at it. However, it constantly pauses and remains choppy but the audio will continue. I have a treo 600 and i store the movies on the sd card and the player on my treo. Is this why its so slow? Is it the 600? and help would be great.

22

by Ruben | Apr 30, 2005 9:02:37 PM

What other files need to be installed for TCPMP to work? I am having trouble playing "Avi" files.
Any advice

23

by Felix | May 1, 2005 8:54:57 AM

I've had my Treo 650 for one week now and am in love!
I use AutoGK to convert my DVDs to divx format (for archival purposes) and found that TCPMP works great with the resulting files. Even better, both options are free and relatively painless.

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